If you've ever told your parents about your day at school, or if
you've explained to a friend how to make chicken noodle soup, you
already have practice giving an informative speech. An informative
speech can be used to tell people about something you're interested
in or to explain how to do something. If that sounds easy, it's
because it is. Just choose your topic and make sure you know what
you're talking about.
Steps
- Pick a topic. Unless you're writing your
speech for a school assignment, you probably already know what your
topic is. If you are writing your speech for school,
however, a good rule is to choose something you know a lot about;
this will require the least amount of research. Alternatively, you
may want to pick a topic you're keenly interested in, so you can
research it and learn about it. Remember, informative speeches
simply inform people. You don't want to choose a topic that will
require you to base your speech on your opinion: that's for a
persuasive speech.
- Narrow down your topic. If your speech is
limited to five minutes, you don't have enough time to tell people
all about the history of invention or to explain how to build a
car. You may, however, be able to tell people about the history of
the zipper or how to take apart a carbuerator. You should be able
to thoroughly cover your topic in the time allotted.
- Develop your thesis. Your thesis should be a
statement of what the speech is about, a sentence that describes
your narrow topic. For example, "I am going to explain how to take
apart a carburetor," or "In this speech you will learn about how
the zipper came to be" might be good theses.
- Do your research. If there's one rule to
writing an informative speech it's this: know your subject. If
you're writing about something you know well, you may not need to
do much, if any, research. Otherwise, hit the books, and learn as
much as possible about your topic. Take notes of important
information as you go along.
- Consider your audience. In general, unless
your assignment says otherwise, it's a good idea to assume your
audience knows nothing about your topic. With this in mind, you may
need to give plenty of background information and be careful about
what shortcuts you take in explaining your topic. If, however,
you're giving your speech on carburetors to a group of auto
mechanics, you don't need to give a lot of background information,
because they already know the topic well.
- Outline your speech. Write a list of the
information you think should be included. Put the list in logical
order. If you're telling people how to do something, your outline
might look a bit like the bolded first sentences in the steps of
this wikiHow article. Remember you want everyone listening to go
away with at least one piece of information they didn't know.
- Write an introduction. Your introduction
should grab the audience's attention, perhaps with an amusing
anecdote or an interesting quote relevant to your topic. Then you
should proceed to give your thesis statement, and then, if it's a
long or complicated speech, provide your audience with a
roadmap.
- Expand your outline to make the body of the
speech. Go through each key point on your outline and
it.
- Write your conclusion. A conclusion should
quickly summarize the main points of the speech. Ideally, your
conclusion should refer back to the introduction in some way--this
shows the speech is cohesive and tells the audience that you have
come full circle.
- Time your speech. If you have been given a
time limit, practice your speec
